Read Rules Run.

For every fact the business depends on, there is exactly one place that owns the answer, it is current, and the system says so rather than guessing.

It is not a folder and it is not a discipline. It is a guarantee about answers, including the answer "I cannot tell you, and here is why".

For exampleA client’s address lives on their file. The invoice, the contract and the welcome email all read it from there. Change it once and it is right everywhere.

Every claim the business makes about how it behaves is written down, in one place, and enforced by the system instead of by memory.

Every rule lives here, whatever it governs. A rule about where a fact is kept is still a rule, not a filing convention.

For example"Every invoice is approved before it goes out." Written once, and the system stops an unapproved one leaving. Nobody has to remember.

The work itself. Fed by READ and RULES, feeding straight back into both, so the source of truth gets better every time somebody uses it.

One loop, turned by a named person. Reconcile, do the work, write back what happened. Activity on its own is not RUN.

For exampleBefore a client call, pull up their file. Have the call. Put what was agreed back on the file. The next call starts from there, not from memory.

Every claim is stated in full, in the same shape every time.

No rule-voiced prose with nothing behind it.

1. Declare · 1

   Every rule has a record

   One written record per rule: what it covers, who owns it, and what it is checked against.

   A rule that only lives as a sentence in a handbook checks nothing. It does not count.

2. Declare · 2

   Ask once, get one answer

   Ask for a fact and you get one answer, from one owner, and you can see how current it is.

   What is this client’s rate? One answer, with the date it was last set.

3. Declare · 3

   Say how often, and when to worry

   For each regular job, say what it is, how often it happens, and how long a silence is too long. The system spots the silence.

   Invoices go out monthly. Six weeks with none sent, and the system says so.

4. Declare · 4

   A spending limit, with a unit

   Every system names what it may spend, and in what. A machine watches it, and a breach reaches a named person.

   No more than $200 a month on software. Go over, and the owner hears that day.

Every rule here is DECLARE, seen from closer up. How each one is tested is in the specification.

Every rule and every fact has exactly one place that owns it. Everything else calls it or is built from it.

Repeating a fact is not the violation. Repeating it without naming where it came from is.

1. Own · 1

   One home per fact

   Each fact has one home. Every copy points back to it and says which version it took.

   Your prices live in one price list. The website and the proposal both point at it.

2. Own · 2

   One person, no machine required

   One named person runs it. Switch every machine off and every rule can still be met, by hand. Hand it to someone new and it still works.

   The automation breaks on a Friday. The week still closes, by hand.

3. Own · 3

   Everything in one place

   Every record sits in exactly one place in the structure. Never two. Never none.

   A job lives under one client. Not filed under two, and not floating loose.

Every rule here is OWN, seen from closer up. How each one is tested is in the specification.

Decisions are added to, never rewritten. Superseded, not edited. State lives in files, not in conversations.

The only one of the four that admits no exception, because declaring an exception is itself an act of recording.

1. Record · 1

   One gate, and it will not rewrite

   Every change to the record passes through one gate. Anything that tries to rewrite what is already there is refused.

   Someone tidies last month's job log and changes a date. The edit is refused. The correction goes in as a new, dated entry.

2. Record · 2

   A restore you have proved

   You can get it back, and you know the date you last proved it. That date goes stale, and the system says so.

   "Trusted from 3 March, because that is when the backup was last restored and checked."

3. Record · 3

   The loop leaves evidence

   Reconcile, do the work, write back. Each step leaves its own evidence that someone can find without help.

   Busy is not proof. A call that never reached the file never finished the loop.

4. Record · 4

   Versions that mean something

   A change is small, medium or breaking. One question decides it: does a system built on the old version still pass?

   A new optional box on the job sheet is a small change. Removing the sign-off box is breaking. Old jobs stop passing.

5. Record · 5

   A record a rule can hold on to

   A rule can only bind to a record with a name, an address, an owner, a shape, a list of who may write to it, and a check.

   "Owned by the team" is not an owner.

6. Record · 6

   A named store at a fixed address

   Each system names where its records live and gives them addresses that do not move, so a machine can find them unattended.

   "It is all in the cloud" fails. So does "the third tab".

Every rule here is RECORD, seen from closer up. How each one is tested is in the specification.

At least one scheduled review, which finds the rules that are missing and prunes the ones that are dead.

And which has to be able to report its own staleness. A review that cannot say it stopped running is not a review.

1. Review · 1

   Checks fire on their own

   Every rule is checked when something happens or when the clock says so. Never when someone remembers.

   A job is marked complete without its sign-off sheet. It is flagged the moment it closes. Nobody has to ask.

2. Review · 2

   Every turn counts

   Each turn of the loop has a start, an end and an outcome, and can be counted. A turn where nothing happened still counts.

   The Monday review with nothing to report still gets logged. Otherwise quiet and skipped look the same.

3. Review · 3

   A review on a timetable

   At least one review runs on a schedule, and a machine can read when it last ran and what it found.

   Accounts are checked every Friday. Anyone can see the last check ran on the 9th and found two gaps.

4. Review · 4

   A tally of repeats

   The system counts what keeps coming back and puts it forward. Only a person decides what becomes a rule.

   The same manual fix three times. It gets flagged as a rule waiting to be written.

5. Review · 5

   When a fact has moved on

   If work is about to run on an out-of-date fact, both versions are shown and the owner decides. Not the clock.

   A quote is about to go out on last year's prices. The owner sees both price lists and picks before it sends.

Every rule here is REVIEW, seen from closer up. How each one is tested is in the specification.

The specification is the promise. Underneath it sits the machinery that keeps the promise. Think of the plumbing in a house.

The Dock has its own specification, versioned on its own, because joints change more often than principles do.

1. Store

   The pipes

   Where your records actually sit. A monday board, a database, a folder of files. You choose it. The specification does not.

2. Dock

   The thread on every joint

   Not a part you buy. It is the standard that makes any tap fit any pipe. Every system built to the specification has one.

3. Engines

   The taps and the boiler

   Working builds that do a job, like finding leads or running the weekly numbers. They plug in through the Dock, so they fit whatever Store you run.

4. Adapter

   Optional. Only where needed

   Where a store or an engine from somewhere else is not the right shape, an adapter makes it fit the Dock. Most systems never need one.